To Be Victorious: The Maestro Chronicles Book 6

by John Buttrick

“I am Operations Commander Lorain Baler and I have come to kill you Leah Barryn,” a silver-haired, smooth featured Three-bolt Accomplished announced. “The mighty Tarin Conn has killed your Maestro and First Lady. I have been given the honor of ending you.”

  A lightning bolt brighter than any Daniel had ever seen followed her words. The jagged light streaked from the baton, as did powerful harmonic waves, and a crackling boom. The bolt struck where Leah and the circle were still exchanging spells. It had happened in an instant. For a moment all Daniel could see through Sheila was smoke rising from a huge crater. The Sasquatch had moved to a different tree, one farther away from the forest fire. In the deep depression lay thirteen roasted bodies and Leah. She was down, stunned, but still alive. Another lightning bolt equal to the last would likely kill her.

  Daniel’s other Accomplisheds were engaged in their own fights and were unable to come to her aid, but he could, through Find All, and the fact that he could see well enough to distinguish one person surrounded by a hundred people from where he stood on the wall. Multicolored beams of energy were flowing into Baler’s baton and she was preparing to release that potential.

  What would Simon do? He thought about it while fingering the bags of seeds. An idea came that might work; it was an experiment, and not something his Chief Aid was likely to do, but there had to be a first time for everything, especially for anyone born an Aakasear.

  He raised his diamond-bladed knife, which resembled Simon’s Crescendo, and cast Conveyance. He pictured Lorain Baler, and only her, far, far away. At the same moment he cast his spell, Sero, no doubt using Find All in conjunction with Cushion of Air, levitated the First Accomplished out of the crater. The tip of Baler’s baton glowed like a small sun and then she vanished from the circle.

  Several hundred times the power of a One-bolt Accomplished suddenly had no particular focus, yet the Melody she used was completed, the result was inevitable, and what he had been counting on. A huge ball of lighting spun into being, striking out at the baton-wielding casters with silver-blue and yellow crackling arcs of power, burning all one hundred Aakacarns in the circle to individual piles of ash, and then shot up into the sky, possibly dissipating somewhere above the clouds.

  “I see why Sir Daniel has such confidence in you,” General Conner stated, approvingly.

  “Simon is very resourceful,” David responded, helpfully. He knew how to keep a secret.

  Carlos stepped up next to Daniel. “Accomplished Trenca, where did you send her?”

  “I sent her on a quick tour of the airship base that used to be at Los Ryn,” Daniel replied while watching Leah float across the landscape, up the height of the wall, and hover behind the crenellation in front of Sero. He lowered her gently down. Her silks were scorched black and the hood of her cloak had been burned away, but there was not a mark on her skin.

  Carlos smiled, evidently picturing Baler’s new location in his mind. “I just love the Eastern Ocean at this time of year.” His jovial response soon vanished as his eyes settled on the First Accomplished, but he was clearly still pleased at learning the fate of the Operations Commander.

  Silvia poked her head around Daniel, evidently to get a peek at Leah. “If our Maestro had chosen differently, his First Accomplished would have died.”

  That was certainly a validation of his choice, but was it why the decision was so critical? “Was saving her the reason the choice made by the Maestro was so pivotal or is there something else that must be accomplished while I’m here?”

  “I am more concerned about what that female Serpent said,” Conner interrupted. “Is Sir Daniel, the Chosen Vessel, dead? You never clarified that detail.”

  Daniel bent down to touch Leah’s forehead, but her personal shield prevented him from being able to cast a spell to assess her health. Her chest was rising and falling. He moved his hand near her nose and could feel her exhaling. “Her shield absorbed most of the energy from the lightning bolt but some of the electric blast reached through the vulnerable points in her shield. None of us can help her until she awakens and ceases the potential feeding the spell.”

  The General let out a grunt. The man was not used to having to wait on an answer but assessing Leah’s condition had been more important to Daniel.

  “This is for your ears only,” Carlos said while stepping up to Conner. “The Maestro is alive and if anyone places him in danger by repeating this, that person will answer to me.”

  “Spoken like a true bodyguard,” Daniel said and straightened to Simon’s height. It seemed a little strange to look up to a man who once had to look up to him.

  Conner’s eyes narrowed, he clearly did not appreciate being spoken to in a less than respectful tone and especially when there was an implied threat. “Accomplished, if word of Sir Daniel leaves this section of wall, it will be a result of you and yours speaking casually of him out in the open the way you have been.”

  Samuel appeared on the wall and he gave Daniel a double take, his thick eyebrows twitched, and then he nodded as if satisfied with whatever conclusions came to him. The spell Restoration had been used in order to grow him a new hand, so he had to know who he was facing. “I have come to report that the Serpents are teleporting out of the area. My sources at Mount Suteck have informed me that Vance Cummin has declared the mission a success even though he lost an Operations Commander and her entire Grand Circle. The loss is a mystery to them and to me. They believe Leah is dead,” he stated and glanced at her lying at Sero’s feet. “I can see she is breathing.”

  “It seems the Serpents wanted to eliminate the top leaders of the Atlantan Guild in one evening,” Conner stated a conclusion Daniel agreed with. “The attack here was meant to draw the First Accomplished. Once the Serpents realized she was here, they sent in the commanding Aakacarn. It was Sir Daniel’s Chief Aid here who sent a beam of light at the center of the circle. There was a bright flash and all of them were consumed by ball lightning.”

  Leah glowed with potential for a spell, which ended with her eyes opening. “Now that I have healed the hurts I can say, that lightning bolt was certainly a jolt, one I do not care to experience again.”

  Daniel took hold of her hand and pulled her up. “We will see if we can arrange safer battles in the future.”

  “I have come to expect cheeky remarks from you, Simon Trenca,” Leah replied. Stunned she had been, but that did not mean her wits had been fried. She was attempting to keep Daniel’s true identity a secret.

  Conner eyed everyone standing in the group, his brow wrinkled, as if piecing the last cutouts of a puzzle together in his mind, and he finally focused on Daniel. “Even though many battles are taking place as we speak, I knew a Royal Knight of the Realm would not allow this city to fall.” It was probably seeing a Conductor of the Atlantan Guild giving a report to an aid that made him suspicious of who the Simon Trenca in front of him truly was.

  “You are correct,” Daniel replied, confirming the General’s conclusion without stating it outright. “I imagine whichever hotspot the First Accomplished chose to appear at would have soon been visited by an Operations Commander. The Serpent Guild tried to kill the top leaders of the Atlantan Guild and thinks that it has succeeded; we are going to let them think so for a little while longer.”

  Conner nodded. “Used skillfully enough, the tactic could hurt them in the near future, and have a great impact on the outcome of a given battle, but wait too long and our side might lose heart in the belief the Serpents succeeded.”

  “A point worth considering,” Daniel replied. Many people would lose heart if they thought the Chosen Vessel was dead and many more would panic.

  Samuel looked to the west. “The two foreign legions, what remains of them, have laid down their weapons and are being watched by the Benhannon Guard. Captain Bower and Lieutenant Keenan are escorting the Generals this way. I wonder what the Maestro would have us do.”

  Daniel turned to General Conner. “He would want the Ducaunan Legion Commander to accept the
formal surrender and take charge of the matter.”

  “He certainly would,” Leah added. “The guild needs its leaders to be at Shantear so they can decide how to respond to the events of the night.”

  “That sounds like what your Maestro would do,” Conner replied. “But it would be helpful if some of the Benhannon Guard remained behind to assist my men.”

  Daniel had no problem leaving some of his people to help out. “I think the knight would approve. He would also caution you about using the spell-powered cutlasses that have been collected. Those weapons draw more life-force energy from the user than do the deathsticks.”

  Conner nodded gravely. “I will admit to having been tempted, but will take your warning to heart.”

  Carlos rubbed his hands together. “I think our Maestro would declare the current chore to be finished and ask to be transported back to Shantear.”

  “Yes,” Daniel agreed, “he likely would.”

  In the time it took for little Sheila to leap from the branch of one tree to the next as she followed the departing Sasquatches, Daniel was at Shantear.

  Chapter Twenty: A Change In Plan

  After some kissing and hugging, Daniel rested his head on the pillow and Sherree settled her ear on his chest. The warmth of her body against his was a comfort and took his mind off, for a little while, everything going on outside of their bedroom deep within Mount Shantear. He still had to defeat Tarin Conn before the fall or risk not winning at all, and time was slipping by rapidly, but he managed to shove the prediction into one of the many compartments in his mind and slam the door. It had taken him a quarter of a mark to block out the flow of information from the thousands of creatures linked to his mind, all wanting to share what they were seeing and feeling.

  So much had been going on since leaving Bolover nearly a month earlier, battles and such; he began to wonder if there was a corner of the continent that enjoyed a modicum of peace. He managed to get some of his avian scouts to the west coast of Serinia, learned the Zuethans were expanding their presence, and it seemed a major conflict would soon take place between the fifty white warships and the Serinian Navy, a situation he could do nothing about. His plate was full and so he banished the knowledge deep into the storehouse of his mind.

  His meeting with Lauren Van Efery, who was mourning the deaths of his father and brothers, had ended with Daniel promising the heir-apparent that the rebels in Taracopa would be stomped down on hard in the coming campeign. The only comforting news he had given the teenager was that Queen Serafa, Lauren’s mother, survived and was in New Oben with Queen Clarees.

  He refocused on his wife, who was sixty-six days along in her pregnancy. Loving on the beautiful woman lying in his arms had done more to help him relax than any mental exercise could have accomplished. He had in the past soared along mentally with birds of prey, run with wolves, swam as one under the ocean with Horatio the ray, and awesome as those experiences had been, being with Sherree top them all.

  The fighting had been nearly non-stop, but the strings of victories were worth the time expended, and yet a break in the violence had to come for him and his wife, even if only briefly. Simon had promised that no one would interrupt their sleep period, which began at twilight and was to last six marks. After nearly a mark into the scheduled rest it seemed the Chief Aid was keeping his word. Daniel knew his friend would take steps to insure against minor matters interfering with the respite from the demands of leadership.

  He played the music in his mind, casting What Is This, and concentrated on the baby growing in the womb. Clarion wiggled at sensing the tingle of his life-force energy. He went deeper into her recipe strands and even though she was perfect, he strengthened the substances that constituted each strand, desiring her to be as healthy as she could be. While he was pulling his perspective back to where he could watch her tiny little body, he caught a glimpse of her vat of life-force energy. Like that of the princess forming in Queen Cleona, his daughter’s reservoir was full of a blue liquid that was slightly lighter than his. The odds were against her being an Aakacarn, fifty to one, so he suspected the color would turn clear by the time she was born. Even so, having a little extra energy could not do any harm and would likely be to her benefit.

  Her mother giggled and soon amber energy mingled with topaz and both were focusing on the girl Sherree named after her maternal aunt. “Our daughter is going to grow up in a world free of the Dark Maestro and the Serpent Guild,” she said in a soft voice, and then incidentally added, “I love the sound of your heart beating in my ear.”

  He ceased the spell on his unborn daughter and focused on his wife. With a sweep of his hand he brushed the long yellow-gold hair to the right and began caressing the smooth skin of her shoulders, down along the spine to the small of her back, and then ran his fingers along the contours of her warm flesh over and over again while speaking his thoughts. “I love holding you and as for ridding the world of Tarin Conn and his guild, I’ll give it a mighty try.”

  The moment was interrupted by tinkling chimes. “Someone is in our receiving room,” Sherree told him what he already knew.

  She sighed and rolled over, allowing him to fling his covers aside and get out of bed. Instead of fully dressing, he shrugged into his silk cloak and wrapped it around his body like a robe. “That is certainly better than stepping out naked,” she commented. Since the Lobenian beauty did not move, he concluded his wife was going to remain in bed even before she added, “One of us needs to get some sleep.”

  Her reasoning made sense. “I thought so too,” he replied and left the room.

  Jaim Cutler, eighteen, thin, and clean shaven with his dark hair cut short, was standing in the middle of the receiving room. His topaz-colored wool uniform with the broad silver stripe on the shoulders and pant legs was different from the blue or copper silks worn by most everybody else at Shantear. Beside him was Chamberlain Bercassie, dressed in a violet gown. The stately gray-haired woman raised her pointed nose toward the ceiling and announced, “Her Majesty requires your immediate presence.”

  Daniel focused on Jaim, who was quick to explain. “Sir Daniel, Chief Aid Trenca brought me here from the Northland Holding to guard your door,” it was a good start. He swallowed and continued. “The Queen’s Chamberlain demanded to be granted entrance. I told her this was the first opportunity you have had to sleep in days, but she insisted a Royal Knight of the Realm makes himself available to his monarch at any mark, day or night.”

  The young man began to sweat and Daniel realized it had to be the disapproving look on his face that was making the Sentinel nervous. “I understand, and you were correct to bring the Chamberlain to me. Cherian, wait here while I change into my uniform.”

  If she did not like the use of her first name, too bad for her. He did not wait for an answer, not wanting to unleash the irritation bubbling inside him. After all she was only doing her job, even though there was no longer a palace to be chamberlain of.

  A Royal Knight of the Realm did have obligations and responding to a royal summons was one of them, his being a Seven-bolt Accomplished and the Maestro of the Atlantan Guild did not change a thing. Would the time come for the last title to take precedence over the first? It was a good question and also one to contemplate sometime in the future, assuming he survived what was to come. Tarin Conn was far older and much more powerful than Daniel, who knew he could not win a potential to potential battle of endurance with his adversary as he had done against Balen Tamm. That thought was not any more productive than the one about the titles, so he flicked it to the deep recesses of his mind.

  He entered his room and went to the wardrobe, containing exact duplicates of the clothing in the master bedroom below the mansion. The garments in his wardrobe at the Northland Holding no longer existed, nothing above ground on his land in the north remained except the outer defensive walls. The shield he placed on them still held, making them nearly indestructible, and a permanent part of the landscape. The buildings would be rem
ade eventually, but he decided to allow the Serpents to learn the hard way that they had only destroyed the tip of the iceberg.

  “I see you are pulling out your uniform,” Sherree spoke while shifting the covers around her.

  Daniel had thrown his cloak in a chair, put on his underwear, and had his wool pants in hand when she made the observation. “Cleona requires my immediate attention. It must be important or she would not have sent Cherian to fetch me.”

  Sherree sat up, causing the covers to fall to her waist by the swift action. “I figured the matter had to do with your duties as a knight. A member of the Atlantan Guild would have used an amulet.”

  He never grew tired of staring at his wife, but if he did not stop, his pants would never get pulled up to his waist, at least not anytime soon. “You figured right. Cherian did not disclose the matter; she might not even know why I have been summoned. It is enough for her that Cleona requires my presence.”

  “And it should be enough for you,” the Lady replied. She understood all about noble, civil, and martial responsibilities, her being related to the ruling monarch of Lobenia. “Let me know what the Queen wants when you get back.”

  As she settled back down and pulled up the covers, he let out a sigh, then finished dressing and stepped out into the receiving room. “Jaim, watch the door and see that no one disturbs Lady Sherree.”

  “It will be as you say, Sir Daniel,” the Sentinel replied.

  When they left the private chambers, Cherian actually stepped ahead as if they were in the palace in Ducanton and Daniel was a petitioner for an audience with the Queen. He increased the length of his strides, forcing her to do the same in order to keep up with him. It was a petty thing to do and yet he did it anyway. Duty demanded that he appear before Cleona, but he had no intention of being treated as a visitor in his own guild headquarters, and had to admit, at least to himself, he was still a little miffed at being summoned from his bed. Fortunately, Cherian chose not to comment and was the very picture of decorum as she strode beside him. She probably took his haste as eagerness to go before the Queen.